Hi all
This always confuses me:
Should it be:
Hanging On the Telephone or Hanging on the Telephone
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See also: Take On Me, Come On Eileen, Shine On You Crazy Diamond.
“Hanging On” is a phrase that needs both words to make sense. “Hanging the Telephone” says something very different.
An ancient discussion that probably explains it better: Capitalization: "Come on Eileen" or "Come On Eileen"? (Page 1) — Style Discussion — MusicBrainz Forums
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Ty Ivan, have a nice day
If it’s the Blondie song, the lyrics are “Don’t leave me hanging on the telephone”. “On” here is a preposition and according to the guidelines, should be in lowercase.
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That is what I thought that is why I asked. Now I am even more confused. Every title is now Hanging On the Telephone. 
When “hanging on” is used as a phrasal verb, where “on” is not a preposition, it should be “Hanging On” with capital letters. “Hanging on” here means not letting go of something.
The Blondie song is talking about leaving somebody “hanging”, meaning leaving somebody in suspense or uncertainty. “Hanging” and “on” are not used together as a phrasal verb in the song, so “on” should be in lowercase.
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Ty
I don’t understand why ALL titles don’t have every word capitalized. You make it unnecessarily complicated and there is too much checking to be done. 90% of the time I am busy editing titles because so many mistakes are made. (And I still make plenty of them see this title) Then you also get the endless discussions with new editors.
If English speakers are already having a discussion about On or on, how can I do it right as a non-English speaker?
(Google translation)
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You have to be precise like a machine. 
Because it would look ugly.
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Whahha No this looks ugly, it’s confusing, it gives you a lot of extra work, you have a lot of discussions, lot of mistakes etc etc etc.
If you think this looks ugly just do it like a sentence then, problem also solved. Just look at the the Dutch titles… problems solved and it looks so beautiful Jesus
In every European language we write the titles like a sentence, why should English be the exception to that rule
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We put a lot of effort into being the exception to as many rules as possible.
But yes, this style is established enough that both all words capitalised and sentence case look wrong / ugly to me now.
I definitely sympathise with it being complicated, though, and there are cases (like this one!) where I am not immediately sure myself. Lots of English print media have huge style manuals to try to cover all the edge cases. This tool can be useful, but is not perfect. (IIRC, AP or AMA are the closest styles to MB.)
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Hey Real,
Thank you for the tool. If I make a mistake now I can blame the tool 
Should have pointed out one particularly useful feature: if you hover your cursor over words in the output, it explains why it chose the capitalisation it did. This can be helpful for checking for mistakes or consistency with MB’s style guidelines.
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As I clearly proved, I have no idea what is going on most of the time. No idea what a “preposition” is. And I am a native English speaker. 
Far too long since I was at school. And we were never taught this style then anyway.
Still think, Dutch titles are the best looking titles in the world, yes they are
Thanks, really great!
In case of this title, it seems to confirm what I have been saying all along. (Edit #98127277 - MusicBrainz)
→ “Don’t Leave Me Hanging on the Telephone” (title case for the full line)
…
on is not capitalized because it seems to be used as a preposition.
…
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I’m not an English speaker, but I agree. Looking at the sentence and the lyrics, this is not the phrasal verb “hang on”, which btw is not followed by a “sth” to be hung on, but perhaps a time indicator (“hang on a second”).
To me this is just the verb “hang”, as in (almost literally) being hung on/from the telephone (inside/at the booth), trying time and time again while the other side ignore the calls.
What’s more, if it were the phrasal verb “hang on”, the syntax would have gone “Don’t leave me hanging on on the telephone” (two “ons”).
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Interesting!
Which makes:
Don’t Leave Me Hanging On on the Telephone